3. More Skill Involved
A lot of action games merely see you lock-on to a target or an assailant with auto-aim ala Grand Theft Auto and pull the trigger a few times until they fall to the ground dead. It is a simple (and effective) concept but not one that is altogether too challenging. During combat in Heavy Rain, the player would be provided with a series of button prompts, and were required to hit a specific button on the controller in order to play out a corresponding action or movement, such as attempting to punch someone in the face or dodge a hammer blow with a wrench, for example. Failure to hit the corresponding button in time means you lost a foothold in the fight and more failure ultimately meant death. It's far more challenging than simply going on until your health bar runs down to zero before filling up on a conveniently-placed "first aid kit" located on the wall of a building or something (and more realistic, for that matter, there is no health bar in Heavy Rain, much like real life). Overall, Heavy Rain was a very difficult game to play if you weren't attentive enough, which is a refreshing change from the dead-behind-the-eyes pulling of a trigger shoot-out found in the majority of action games today.